This story comes to us from reader David and his family. I am so excited to share this wonderful experience about transitioning into homeschooling, and the whys behind their decision. If you would like to share your story, find out how here. 

To all who want to know,

My disgust at our legislators has reached epic levels. Disgust for allowing our education system to erode to the point that being the best in public school still means that over 40 other countries will be better than your child. There are many problems in this country but if we were to look around we would see that education is the answer. Not a scapegoat.
By the time our first child reached 1st grade I had him understanding the principles of all math, algebra and basics of geometry. We sent him to public school because we wanted him to learn how to interact with other children – the good and the bad. Turns out that the bully situation outweighs the good but we persevered because we believe that being a citizen in the USA still meant something.

Over the next 5 years the bully problem persisted but his grades showed he was doing remarkably well. Mostly A’s with a few B’s. We helped him stand up to bullies so he could be free of the fear and his grades took off even more. We were happy with our decision to trust the system. Even though each year the education budget was being slashed. Our happiness was short when our son started 7th grade.

By midterm our son was shown to be failing the “advanced” math and science courses. We had no idea what was going on and none of our phone calls/emails were ever answered with any insight (when they rarely were answered). We were angry but worried that maybe something was wrong. First fear was with our son but upon speaking with him we learned that the worry belonged to the school itself.

Their reasoning in a defensive response was “we use college prep tests” as a satisfactory reason why our son went from A’s to F’s. When I asked “So what you are saying is the first 6 years are proof that the system is not prepping our children?” I got no response. Come to find out “advanced” classes meant very loud classrooms where they flipped rubber bands at each other when the teacher wasn’t looking. Our son was distraught, saddened and came home with a headache every day due to the noise. We had enough.

I contacted local organizations about homeschooling and learned that as parents we were in our right to teach our children how we see fit. We pulled our son out of the public school system thinking that this would be a new step. It was a new step in horrified clarity.

In 6 years they have taught our son to not think. To not be creative. To not wonder. To not theorize. To not extrapolate. To not expand his vocabulary. In 6 years they had taught him to never think but to just remember what he was told for a silly test that determined funding (ISTEP) apparently. My intelligent 1st grader who could solve basic algebra problems now had no idea how to solve anything at all. Nothing. He was incapable of free thought because he was waiting to be told what to know for a test.

It has been almost 4 months since we pulled him out of the public school system and I am happy to say that now he has had philosophical discussions of what is consciousness, can now solve any linear equation, graph said equations, understand how to figure and explain slope of a line, understand how to prove geometry theorems, has increased his vocabulary by leaps and bounds, started to read Shakespeare, understands quantum entanglement enough to theorize for his final project of a ghost hunting documentary (based upon his favorite show ‘Destination Truth’) he is producing to discuss several “what if’s” that can be tied to physics. He is also learning cursive, sculpting again and working on creating perspective animation with Pivot software.
We gave our son to your system in good faith as American citizens and you have proven that you are incapable of teaching our children. Our biggest dread is we have a daughter who is in same school so we now know that she will be homeschooled soon. She likes the attention she gets for her “A’s” as well as being a social butterfly. But by 7th grade she will be homeschooled as well. To repair the damage incurred by an absolutely abysmal attempt at improving our education system.

Just recently our son finally had a spark that there is something beyond being told what to remember. Out of the blue he stated “I want to be an explorer. There are a lot of amazing places in the world. It would be cool to discover something that changes the course of human history. That would be awesome.” He said this so matter-of-factly that he did not notice my stunned by pride look on my face. He just wandered to his room to get his clay so he could sculpt a new creature after he confidently worked on over 50 algebra equations.

He got all 50 correct by the way.